It's Father's Day, so let's listen in as three dads (Schayes, Rautins and Grilli) talk about their sons

Syracuse, N.Y. -- It happens all the time that sons follow in their fathers’ footsteps. And that is exactly what took place in the Schayes, Grilli and Rautins households here in our backyard.

There was Dolph Schayes, who played 16 seasons in the NBA . . . and his son, Danny, who played 18 seasons in the NBA. There was Steve Grilli, who pitched in four big-league campaigns . . . and his son, Jason, who has pitched in eight big-league campaigns. There was Leo Rautins, who scored more than 1,000 points for Syracuse University before moving onto the NBA . . . and his son, Andy, who scored more than 1,000 points for the Orange and hopes to move onto the NBA this fall.

Decorated fathers . . . accomplished sons. And those sports fans among us here in Central New York have had front-row seats.

I recently sat with the dads (Dolph, Steve and Leo) and served as a kind of moderator as they spoke about their boys (Danny, Jason and Andy). On this Father’s Day, I invite you to listen in.

But first, the subjects of this piece:

THE FATHERS:
-- Dolph Schayes, 82. Played 16 years in the NBA (1948-’64), averaging 18.2 points and 10.6 rebounds per game.
-- Steve Grilli, 61. Played in four major-league seasons (1975-’77 & ’79), compiling a 4-3 record with three saves and a 4.51 earned run average.
-- Leo Rautins, 50. Scored 1,031 career points for Syracuse University (1980-’83) before playing in two NBA campaigns (1983-’85).

THE SONS:
-- Danny Schayes, 51. Played 18 years in the NBA (1981-’99), averaging 7.7 points and 5.0 rebounds per game.
-- Jason Grilli, 33. Has played in eight major-league seasons (2000-’01 & ’04-’09), compiling an 18-18 record with two saves and a 4.74 earned run average.
-- Andy Rautins, 23. Scored 1,121 career points for Syracuse University (2005-’10) and is currently pursuing a roster spot in the NBA.

Now, let's begin . . .

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Dennis Nett / The Post-StandardA roundtable discussion with Dolph Schayes (left), Leo Rautins (center) and Steve Grilli -- all former professional athletes who are the fathers of professional athletes. Or, in Rautins' case, father of a future pro athlete, since Andy will likely play for pay somewhere. They discuss the experience of raising athletes in their long shadows.

Leo Rautins: “We love all of our kids. I don’t love any of mine more than the others. But all of us at this table share a special bond with our sons because they’re doing what we used to do. We experienced what they’ve gone through. I may not understand all of what my other kids have gone through, but I can understand basketball with Andy. And, Steve, you can identify so closely with Jason. And Dolph, you can do the same with Danny.”

Dolph Schayes: “The son has to be a good person. He has to be good in the community, good to his family. You have to be a real good person or the rest of it doesn’t matter as much."

Steve Grilli: “One of the proudest moments I’ve had, and I’ve had quite a few during Jason’s career, was when the Colorado Rockies nominated him for the Roberto Clemente Award for community service. He was up against guys like Derek Jeter, who I think won it that year. And now Jason is trying to build a School for the Deaf out there.”

Schayes: “I’ve been around for 80 years, so I hear things and it triggers things. And I’ve got more triggers than both of you guys. Danny was a first-round draft choice of the Utah Jazz – No. 13. And I felt so great. But you know what I got a bigger kick out of? That he was nominated by his professors to be a Rhodes Scholar and that he was in the running for it right to the end. Somebody from the Naval Academy beat him out. That’s the proudest I’ve ever been of Danny.”

Rautins: “It’s how people remember your son. Take this past season with the Syracuse team. It was a special year. Andy’s not the greatest player who ever played here, but that was his team and it captivated this city. And so many people talked about the positive effect Andy had on that team. That, to me, is special. I don’t care about, ‘Your kid had a great game.’ But when they say, ‘Your kid is a great kid,’ that’s what you want to hear. We were in New Hartford and a lady came up to me and said, ‘Thank you.’ And I said, ‘For what?’ And she said, ‘Because of the family time we were able to share watching your son, Andy, play basketball.’ That was pretty cool.”

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Grilli: “I was going to name him after my father, whose name is Julio. But my wife said, ‘There’s no way.’”

Rautins: “I never could stand the name, Leo. I never liked it, personally. I’m used to it now, but it’s not a name that jumped out to me. And I think there’s enough pressure without naming your son after you. That’s tough. Dolph’s a common name. Why didn’t you go with that?”

Schayes: “Yeah, Dolph was a very big name. Especially after World War II. You know, ‘Say hello to little Adolph.’ I named him after one of the most wonderful people I’d ever met. He was fair and smart and all of that – Danny Biasone, the owner of the Syracuse Nationals. There was nothing untoward. I didn’t expect to get a raise in salary, but I would have taken it. Daniel Leslie Schayes. Leslie was the doctor who delivered Danny.”

Rautins: “I’ll have to start calling him ‘Leslie’ now.”

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Schayes: “When I was in Philadelphia coaching the 76ers, I came home and was walking down the street one day. And one of the kids came running out of the house and was yelling, ‘There’s a kid over there in the Schayes house, and he’s bigger than all of us!’ The kid was 10 years old and Danny was six. I figured then that Danny had the makings of being a big guy and maybe a basketball player. You know, height helps in that game.”

Grilli: “Because he always hung around the clubhouse, Jason wanted to be a ballplayer since he was eight or nine years old. But it really wasn’t until his junior year in high school that I saw his talent level was above the rest. He was bigger than most of the kids, but he was skinny. He was a rail. I was scouting at the time for the St. Louis Cardinals and I knew he was projectable kid. You know, put a little meat on his bones and he had a chance."

Rautins: “Andy was always good at everything. First time he picked up a football, a perfect spiral. First time he picked up a baseball, tremendous pitcher. Everything was easy for him. That set the wheels turning a little bit for me. When kids were watching ‘Dr. Doolittle,’ Andy was watching ‘Red on Roundball.’ That’s not normal. One day we were at Manley Field House and I yelled, ‘Come on, Andy! We gotta go!’ And he started running to me as fast as he could. And Bernie Fine said, ‘Do you see that?’ And I said, ‘What are you talking about?’ He said, ‘Andy’s not even looking at the ball and he’s dribbling with his left hand.’ And he’s a righty. And he was three years old.”

Schayes: “Oh, yeah? Well, Danny was dribbling when he was three weeks old. I mean, he was dribbling his food. But still.”

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Grilli: “Jason was literally booed out of Detroit. Remember what happened to Ed Whitson in New York with the Yankees? The same thing happened to my son in Detroit. And when he left, he had the best ERA on the team. They thought they had a championship team there that year, and when they got off to a bad start, Jason became the scapegoat. And it ate me up inside because there’s nothing you can do about it. I had to sit in the stands and listen to what people were saying about him, and I had to do everything in my power to hold off from socking somebody.”

Rautins: “You just can’t have rabbit ears. I’ve always told Andy, ‘Don’t read the papers. Don’t watch the stuff. Don’t read the blogs. Don’t do any of that. We’ll keep a scrapbook for you and you can read it when it’s all said and done.’ This blogging world is scary. It’s anonymous hate. When I read the stuff that people write, it’s cruel. It’s hurtful. And it’s anonymous. Andy’s heard it all. ‘The kid shouldn’t have been here. He stinks. He’s too skinny. He’s only here because his old man got him in.’ I wish I had that kind of clout.”

Schayes: “It all started for Danny when he was picked by the Jazz. They had a big party in Utah. The fans out there wanted Herb Williams of Ohio State, and he was available. And they wanted Kelly Tripucka of Notre Dame, and he was available. And when they announced, ‘The Jazz takes Danny Schayes,’ they booed. I didn’t speak to him about it. I figured he’d just have to work through it. In my case, I got into a little trouble watching him play. I remember Syracuse was in Philadelphia against Villanova and I was unhappy with the referee whistling what I call ‘vicinity fouls’ against Danny, who was playing against John Pinone.”

Rautins: “I remember that. Do you remember the headline in the paper the next morning?”

Schayes: “It was something like: ‘Hall of Shamer.’”

Rautins: “No, it was: ‘Schayes Pop’s Off.’”

Schayes: “I was fit to be tied that night. My name was in bigger letters than the type they used in the London tabloids to describe Jack the Ripper. And then there was the time when Danny was with the Orlando Magic and playing the Miami Heat in the playoffs and I ended up wrestling with the team mascot. I mean, it was ridiculous. Rony Seikaly, who was with the Magic at the time, leaned over to Danny and said, ‘Your father’s at it again.’ It was so embarrassing. I’ve made an ass out of myself many, many times.”

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Grilli: “With me and Jason it was different. I mean, Dolph, you’re a Hall of Famer. Leo, you were a first-round draft choice.”

Rautins: “Who got thrown out of the league a year later.”

Grilli: “But I came out of Gannon, an NAIA college and wasn’t even drafted. Our talks were always, ‘Nobody knew who I was. But you’re the No. 4 pick in the whole draft. You’re going to have it a lot tougher than me because people will be expecting a whole lot.’ You get $2 million to come out of college to play baseball, that’s a lot of pressure. Jason was the fastest gun in the West and everybody wanted to prove they were better.”

Rautins: “Andy thought it was great. The fact is, I tried to talk him out of going to Syracuse because this town has always been tough on local kids. And also because he was always going to be compared to me. I told him he’d get sick of if. So I asked him why he wanted to deal with that, and he said, ‘It’ll be cool.’ I was scared when he went to SU. I thought he’d take a ton of crap and end up hating the whole thing. But it worked out great. In fact, he loves talking trash about his career and mine.”

Schayes: “You know, Leo, I didn’t think Andy should have gone to Syracuse, either. I thought it would have been better for him to get away from Syracuse because of everything you just said.”

Grilli: “Jason played for the Tigers in Detroit, where I played. He was born in Detroit. He even wore my old number.”

Rautins: “I told Andy not to wear my number because that would have been too much. So he wore ‘1,’ which was half of ‘11.’ And we both wore No. 10 for Canada.”

Schayes: “I’m sure Danny had a lot of burdens being my son, but it came with the territory. He was his own man and he was smart enough to figure it all out. But he was hurt badly from time to time. Peter Vecsey once wrote down in New York: ‘Danny Schayes looks like his father but plays like his mother.’ He just had to learn how to handle it, and he did. He got the best out of his ability. I wanted him to go to Princeton, where there are no scholarships. But he said, ‘Dad, I always wanted to go to Syracuse. So I’m going there and I’m going to save you some money.’ And he did.”

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Rautins: “There is nothing that I have done that comes close to watching my kid have success. There’s just not. I can hold up a trophy that says I’m the Big East MVP, but that was nothing compared to seeing Andy be the MVP of the state championship. Not even close.”

Grilli: “When I was playing, my dad rarely had a chance to visit me because he was a working fool. He was mechanic outside Brooklyn. He made this one trip to Detroit, which was rare. He was in the family room after the game. I’d pitched five shutout innings against the Yankees. I didn’t get the win, but I shut them down. I gave up only one hit. To Reggie Jackson. And it was being broadcast back to New York on WPIX. Well, my dad put his arms around me and said, ‘I’ve never been more proud of you.’ I had that same moment last year with Jason in New York in the inaugural season at Yankee Stadium. He came in and threw three perfect innings, nine up and nine down. And he came out of the clubhouse and I put my arms around him and said, ‘Now, I know what my father felt like that day.’ I’m sorry. I’m getting a little emotional here.”

Schayes: “I saw that game on TV.”

Grilli: “You get your heart in your mouth. Trust me. I sit in front of that TV and watch Jason and sometimes I can’t breathe, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything in my life.”

Schayes: “I’ve got the satellite dish, so whenever Danny played I watched. Well, one night he was playing against Shaq down in Orlando and Marv Albert was saying, ‘Danny Schayes is outplaying Shaquille O’Neal.’ The goose bumps I got that night . . . It’s like Leo said, or maybe it was Shakespeare. Somebody, anyway. ‘There’s no greater love than a father has for a son.’ Of course, I love my daughters, too. But you get the idea.”

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Grilli: “Not even close. I had good stuff, but Jason has way better stuff that I ever had. He’s bigger and stronger. But his dad had guts. I used to look at the No. 1 draft choice and say, ‘You struck out nine today; I’m gonna strike out 12.’ I would have loved, my prime against his prime, and go at it. That would be great.”

Rautins: “Andy’s better. Look at this team. It had the best regular season in Syracuse history, and it was his team. My team didn’t do that. He’s smarter than me. He’s a better defensive player than me. He shoots lights out. People say I was a passer, but he makes left-handed passes I wouldn’t even try, and I tried a lot of stuff because I had a lot of turnovers.”

Schayes: “Well, me and Danny had two different styles.”

Rautins: “Come on, Dolph. You’d have beaten the hell out of him.”

Schayes: “I could shoot it, but Danny was very strong. He’d push me off my spot. But I’d probably outscore him, because I could shoot it. But he was a good defensive player, he set some great picks, boxed out well. I mean, I never boxed out. He was a fundamental player. More fundamental than me. But, yeah, me against him . . . I probably would have won.”

Rautins: “I’d have had double figures in assists if I played with Andy because I would have gotten him shots all night long. I want to play with guys who know how to play the game and he knows how to play. It’s easier to play when you have guys like Andy on the floor with you.”

Schayes: “I would have loved it. The pick-and-roll is at least 50% of the offensive game in the NBA and with Danny setting picks and flailing out to the comer, if they double-teamed me I would pass it to him for his little jumper. If they didn’t double-team him, I’d be gone to the basket. It would have been a pleasure to play with Danny. We would have been Stockton and Malone."

Grilli: “If I could come back, I’d come back as a catcher and I’d love to catch Jason just from the standpoint of working with him to set up the hitters. It would be like us picking and rolling.”

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Grilli: “Getting what I’m getting from this is just wonderful. This couldn’t have been a better afternoon. But wait. You know what would top this? If we ever had the opportunity to sit around like this again, and have our boys with us. I’d get the chills if we could do that. I really would. This has been cool. This has been really cool.”

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(Bud Poliquin's columns, his "To The Point" observations and his freshly-written on-line commentaries appear virtually every day on syracuse.com. His work can also be found on the pages of The Post-Standard newspaper. Additionally, he can be heard, Mondays through Fridays, on the "Bud & the Manchild" sports-talk radio show on The Score 1260-AM. E-mail: bpoliquin@syracuse.com.)